


Of the Same Steel and Temper

by bellygunnr



Category: Halo (Video Games) & Related Fandoms
Genre: Canon Compliant, Canon-Typical Violence, Gen, Role Reversal, The Fall of Reach Novel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-23
Updated: 2020-12-23
Packaged: 2021-03-10 18:48:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,608
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28251912
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bellygunnr/pseuds/bellygunnr
Summary: “It seems you have made up your mind, John,” Dr. Halsey says slowly. “But are you sure?”“I do not dwell,” John says seriously. “She seems to know how to take action. I can appreciate that in a body.”“But you know she excels particularly nowhere in terms of physical or mental prowess, yet is the most willingly to undertake risks. She got that medal by attacking Covenant head-on and saving Marines in the process.”--John and Cortana role-swap.
Relationships: Cortana & John-117 | Master Chief & Original Male Character(s)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 12





	Of the Same Steel and Temper

John regarded Dr. Halsey calmly as she revealed the information he already knew-- Project MJOLNIR was entering its final stage, and he was a player in its execution. He doesn’t even smile as she continues to talk, only resting his holographic hand on the hilt of his holographic blade, allowing bits of his code to fritz together as he ran operations elsewhere. He was rather proud of his latest bit of detective work. Infiltration was his specialty.

Not that he enjoyed it, but he did like showing off his prowess in all tasks.

“I’ve already selected my teammate,” John announces, cutting off Dr. Halsey.

She stops short, raising an eyebrow, but expression otherwise unreadable.

“And who have you selected, John?” she says patiently.

John unsheathes his blade with a flourish and points theatrically at a picture frame on the corner of Dr. Halsey’s crowded, messy desk. In the picture, a single woman stood at attention while an Admiral-- Stanforth, he notes-- pinned the UNSC Legion of Honor to her chest. Her expression was relatively schooled, but a mischievous brand of fire shone in her eyes, permanently captured in eternity by the photo. He didn’t have to look at the other citations and medals weighing on her chest to know that she was well-accomplished.

A moment passes. When Dr. Halsey doesn’t say anything, seemingly unable to recover, John forges on.

“Master Chief Petty Officer Cortana-117,” he says, weighing each word carefully, “is a highly accomplished and experienced Spartan. I’ve taken the liberty of researching her thoroughly and I like what I’ve seen. As I speak, I am already calculating our compatibility and… find them within acceptable parameters.”

“It seems you have made up your mind, John,” Dr. Halsey says slowly. “But are you sure?”

“I do not dwell,” John says seriously. “She seems to know how to take action. I can appreciate that in a body.”

“But you know she excels particularly nowhere in terms of physical or mental prowess, yet is the most willingly to undertake risks. She got that medal by attacking Covenant head-on and saving Marines in the process.”

“I am aware. Again, that is something I can appreciate in a body, Dr. Halsey.”

John had wandered off from his holopad to stand inches away from Dr. Halsey’s face. His sword is back in its sheathe, hands clasped firmly behind his back. Under the lights, his ancient Spartan armor glitters emerald green and fire yellow, body rapidly shifting between the two colors.

Despite his level best efforts, his emotions tended to reveal themselves. He was tense and excited but most of all, determined. He _would_ have Cortana as his teammate.

“And what of a mission if she were to become compromised? What would you do if she could die?”

John immediately tenses, his holographic form flashing a brilliant ruby red. A second later, it washes back into his neutral dark green, swirling across his stout frame in ragged bands of hue.

“I don’t think you should ask me questions you are not prepared to answer yourself, doctor,” he replies, affecting a flat tone. “You insult me.”

AI and human stare at each other. Dr. Halsey seems flustered, her thoughts visibly racing behind steely eyes. She cuts one last look at Cortana’s photo before allowing her demeanor to shift, conceding defeat with just a tip of her head.

“Very well, then, John. You can have her,” Dr. Halsey says. “Now, what of the rest of the mission?”

* * *

The differences in the new model of armor ranged from subtle to obvious. It was definitely heavier, but the modification of her neural implants made the weight negligible. If she was feeling generous, she might even say she was moving faster in this armor. There was also the addition of the shielding-- a shimmering electric layer that reminded her of oil spills on pavement. Iridescent and full of color, but dangerous.

But there was one more thing-- the second major change they had given Mjolnir. So far, it hadn’t come up at all, overshadowed by the shields. The shields were fantastic (as long as she didn’t slip and fall), but it was high time they moved along.

She cocks her head wordlessly at Dr. Halsey. In reply, Dr. Halsey withdraws something from her bag.

“Your own neural lace has been upgraded to better interact with the armor, as you may know,” she starts, “but it also it interface with an AI. A layer of memory-processor super-conductor has been added between the reactive and bio-layers of your armor.”

Cortana nods once. “The same stuff found in an AI’s core?”

“Correct. Your armor will be able to carry an AI-- the same kind that starships house. John will be able to interface between you and the suit. His primary objective will be to provide intelligence support while you’re on the field.”

“What does that entail?” Cortana says, tilting her helmet.

She liked AIs. They were useful and often had personality. She wasn’t sure about sharing her armor with one, however. John wasn’t even impressive name-- who went to all the trouble of making an AI just to name it John?

“John has been outfitted with the best of ONI’s computer infiltration routines and software. He is also equipped with Covenant translation programs. He’s also quite resourceful, but his specialty is, essentially, spywork,” Dr. Halsey replies.

Hm. So this John would be the AI they brought with them, should the upcoming test go well.

“How much… jurisdiction will he have over the suit?” she asks cautiously.

“None. You will have full control of it at all times. John will only be reading and translating the link you have between your brain and the suit-- and improving upon it, so expect that whatever you’re feeling now to be multiplied.”

Cortana liked the sound of that. Real-time intelligence data and greater physical performance? She would be unstoppable. Provided they got along, of course. But everything Halsey was telling her just raised more questions, but before she could ask, Halsey started talking again.

“I’m afraid we only have a small window of time. Please, kneel down so that we may insert the AI into the suit.”

Obediently, she takes a knee, bowing her head to expose the chip’s slot. There’s a moment of hands flicking something open, then a rush of ice water and pain jolts the back of her neck. The sensation trickles like water down the length of her spine before dissipating, leaving her strangely… the same.

Then the AI spoke, and everything was different.

“Hello, Master Chief,” a deep voice said. It was slightly raspy and reverberated in the suit’s speakers.

“Hello, John,” she answers, eyes wide. “Got enough room in there?”

“Not nearly enough. It will do… Thank you for asking.”

Oh. Well, at least he was honest. It was probably difficult to jam the processing power of a starship into the fractional space of her Mjolnir, though she had to wonder how he was compensating for it.

“Let’s begin the test. The conditions have been changed to involve combat-- not ideal, but it should provide ample opportunity for you two to become acquainted. The “win” condition of the test might be familiar to you, Cortana.”

“Ring the bell?” she guesses wryly.

“Indeed. Be careful, and be wary, Master Chief. I hardly need to remind you to be prepared when ONI is involved, but I will say it anyway. You are also authorized to neutralize any threats to accomplish the objective.”

Then Dr. Halsey leans in, voice low, worry lines etching deep into the contours of her face.

“Some would like to see you fail this test,” she says. “See that you don’t.”

“No, ma’am,” Cortana agrees.

Dr. Halsey nods once, then turns on her heel. Just before exiting the tent, however, she looks over her shoulder to stare into Cortana’s face plate, flanked by technicians.

“The second I leave this tent, you must count to ten. After that, make your way to the obstacle course where the bell will be located. And be careful,” she adds, voice firm. “Good luck.”

Cortana resists the urge to salute Dr. Halsey in jest. Instead, she shakes her body out, getting the feel for the armor one more time. As she wiggles her fingers, she hears the metallic clack of weapons from outside the tent.

Her HUD shimmers. The proximity tracker immediately lights up with yellow blips that turn red on the next cycle.

“Assume that all units are hostile,” John says. “The targets are equipped with MA5B assault rifles. Be prepared for my participation.”

“I hope you participate,” she says dryly. “What do you think about this? We’re engaging our own soldiers.”

Eight.

“We’ll win, but I am more excited to see how you handle this,” John says, a hint of emotion slipping into his gravelly voice.

Nine.

Cortana flicks her eyes across the walls of the tent, noting the surprisingly clear silhouettes of soldiers moving outside. She didn’t enjoy facing off against UNSC personnel, especially when they weren’t Spartans, but she never had a choice. Her apprehension only spikes when the shadowy figures become real, breaking into the tent with guns already brought to bear.

Shock troopers. ODSTs, to be exact.

Ten.

The center Helljumper opened fire on thin air. Cortana dove from her elevated platform before his finger could depress the trigger, but she didn’t target him right away. She ripped the rifle out from his port-side buddy’s hands and winced at the unmistakable sight of a shoulder dislocating. Still, she cracks the butt of the rifle across the lead’s chest before turning on the third, suddenly aware that she was in “Spartan Time.”

To her, the third trooper was moving in slow motion, still caught in the throes of reacting to his companions’ defeat. She rips his gun out of his hands and shoves him to the floor, biting back a sigh at the sensation of ribs cracking.

This suit was definitely a step above the last mark. If she didn’t want to hurt them, she’d have to restrain herself even more.

“That’s an odd notion,” John says suddenly. “You have been ordered to neutralize the targets. Why not kill them?”

Cortana frowns as she bustles out of the tent. Immediately, her motion tracker updates with seven more yellow blips that flash red. If she had to hazard a guess, John was forcing the suit to acknowledge the troopers’ FoF tags as ‘foe.’

Interesting.

“John. I think that might be murder.”

“We do need every soldier available,” he concedes.

The tracker’s blips appeared to be concentrated in another on-site tent. On the far side of the tent, she witnesses an ODST peek around the corner for three full seconds before abruptly withdrawing. A thrown grenade replaces them.

Cortana shoots it out of the air. It detonates in a shower of shrapnel and flame, jostling the tent with the shockwave and shredding holes into its roof, but not catching it alight. She’s cutting an entrance into the tent before the smoke and flak has even cleared.

The troopers are facing away from her, rushing for the exit in uniform, slow motion fashion. To her surprise, one twists around and opens fire, bullets pinging across her chest.

She slings the knife she’d been equipped with into his gut. Shielded or not-- and the shields did their job well, turning the impacts into tickles-- she didn’t take kindly to being shot. His buddies she pursues out of the tent, bringing the butt of her rifle to bear on the back of their skulls.

They drop instantly.

“Unconscious, not dead,” John chimes as she whips around to face the other four troopers. “Thought you’d like to know.”

“Thanks,” she says shortly.

More bullets ricochet off her shields. The meter in the corner of her HUD blinks as it diminishes uncomfortably quickly, still un-replenished from the last round of projectiles. Not eager to damage the armor, she rushes forward, grabbing the closest trooper by the torso.

Effortlessly, she tosses his frame into his allies before grabbing up his gun, crushing the barrel. Her HUD wavers as a bolt of alarm flits through her, gaze drawn to the grenade the furthest ODST was trying to arm.

She lets her boots fall onto the arms of the first two troopers, determinedly not thinking about the state of their bones. She also does not think about how the alarm wasn’t her own, instead focusing on snatching up the final two soldiers by their chestplates and tossing them aside.

“Shoot them,” John hisses into her ear. “They’re not neutralized if they’re conscious or functional.”

“What do they have to gain by fighting me? I threw them forty meters!” Cortana exclaims. “I don’t want to hurt them, John.”

John doesn’t say anything but he does mark their position as nav-points on her HUD. She pointedly ignores him by stripping one of the downed soldiers for their grenades, which she promptly attaches to a magnetic hardpoint on her armor. With that done, she takes to the outer edges of the immediate area, making herself as hard to locate as possible.

The obstacle course is achingly familiar by the time she reaches it. It was an endless expanse of tough gravel, just over ten acres of the stuff. She remembered having to cross it bare-foot multiple times alongside her siblings; she could almost feel the ghostly sensation of rocks stabbing her soles.

Before she could step off, however, John speaks, low and urgent.

“Throw a grenade at the field.”

“That’s-- why?” Cortana asks, bewildered.

“There are Lotus mines and that’s the best way for me to calculate the layout. UNSC Engineers try to randomize the pattern, but humans are predictable creatures,” John says impatiently.

Well, it was as good as reason as any. She pulls a grenade from the stolen bandolier and arms it-- and holds it for three full seconds. With a controlled flick of her arm, she chucks it at the ground, watching it bounce once and explode.

Two Lotus mines explode in a geyser of gravel of dirt in reply several feet apart from each other.

“Give me a second,” John says. “Okay. These are rough estimations, but they shouldn’t get you killed. As you were, Master Chief.”

A graph flickers to life, overlaying itself perfectly across the gravel expanse. Yellow flower-like symbols join it in an affixed pattern, telling her what to avoid. That was… extremely useful.

“Don’t like that they’re using anti-tank mines,” she says, gravel crunching underfoot. “Seems a bit much.”

They make the trek across the gravel field in three minutes.

“Thanks, John. That’s really helpful,” Cortana says, making her sigh of relief productive.

“...There’s radio chatter on D band,” John says, his voice oddly pitched. “Encrypted and encoded, but it’s from the nearby airfield. I don’t like it.”

“That sounds exciting…”

But they had bigger things to worry about. After the gravel field was the long, narrow strip of mud and razor wire. It would be interesting to see how the armor’s shields fared against the constant scrape of barbed line. She doubts she could hunker low enough to avoid it entirely.

...If she didn’t get shot to hell first.

“Chain guns, 11 and 1 o’ clock,” John says, almost as soon as she notices them. “I advise evading. I do not feel like dying today.”

Crawling through the razor bed probably doesn’t count as evading, she thinks dryly. She’s glad for their incredibly slow rotation and similarly slow rate of fire at least. It meant that at least one was deactivated by the time she took off sprinting for it, firing at its power lines with her rifle.

There were two chainguns at the far end of the route, clearly meant to create a field of crossfire should she crawl. She’s silenced the one closest to her, but its cousin’s 30mm rounds punch into her chest, threatening to drop her shield into zero with just a handful of impacts.

She silences it by kicking the first chaingun into its chassis, toppling them both.

“Elegant,” John remarks once the residual firing stops. “I am going to investigate something. Don’t get shot.”

Cortana feels the AI slip out of her neural lace. To escape the sudden gaping emptiness, she charges into the rest of the razor-lined trenches. It gave her a few moments to reflect, too. John was an interesting AI. Not horrible to work with, if a little bossy. And vague, too.

If this didn’t feel so high stakes, she’d be arguing more.

Ice water rushes down her neck the same instant she comes up on the next stage of the obstacle course. Years ago, when they were all very young, the Spartans had dubbed this portion the ‘Pillars of Loki.’ It was a nightmarish network of smooth poles of wood-- razed trees-- interspersed with traps and danger. She’d seen the kind of damage the traps could cause.

She wasn’t keen on taking any of them on.

“The airfield is launching an aircraft,” John announces, his voice edged with anger. “A Skyhawk.”

Fuck.

“Language,” John says sternly. “Do you have any ideas? I calculate roughly 30 seconds before contact.”

Well, the best way to avoid traps was to go around them, right? She stares into the crisscross of pillars and deadly vegetation for a couple seconds too many. It would leave her too exposed to try skirting the borders of the field, but maybe climbing onto the poles…

Yeah, that would work.

Cortana scales the nearest tree with a certain lack of finesse. Her armored fingers leave indents in the hard wood and her boots gouge out chunks of bark and flesh from the pole, but she’s standing atop it with-- 15 seconds to spare.

A timer was now ticking down in the corner of her visor.

“Don’t know if that’s helpful, John,” she mutters.

“Bandit inbound,” John replies. “Ideas?”

She launches herself from one pole to the next, taking a diagonal route across the Pillars of Loki. The Skyhawk was an atmospheric fighter that specialized in close air support. It’s complement of four 50mm cannons and anti-tank missiles made it a terrifying and formidable ship, and against her?

Mjolnir, augmentations, AI assistance…

Well, she was as dead as any Covie soldier.

“Contact!” John barks.

The air thrums violently around Cortana as the aircraft bears down on her position. She kicks off of the pillar, free falling just as a spray of bullets sunder the air. Trees shatter into pieces behind her and the world blurs as she tucks into a roll, hitting the ground.

The Mjolnir’s gel layer absorbs much of the impact, but it still hurts.

“Eleven seconds! Goal: 300 meters!” John barks again.

“You’re yelling,” Cortana huffs, climbing to her feet. “No need to yell!”

Once again, a timer was ticking down on her HUD. Nine seconds and going. She was no Kelly, but how hard could a three hundred meter dash be?

Nothing achievable when it was rockets she was facing. The eight-seven-six seconds must be the Skyhawk’s turn time. Maybe she should run for cover.

“No time! New timer! About face!” John shouts, his voice so intense that it drowned out her own panicked thoughts.

Dirt and grass sprays with the force Cortana applies to twist herself around. Her HUD pulses red once before yet another timer pops up, accompanied by the silhouette of a missile. John’s presence inside her mind and suit is suddenly overwhelming.

“When the timer hits zero, the missile will be on top of us. Deflect it.”

John had a knack for sounding like a drill instructor. Or a suicidal admiral. Firm, commanding, unshakable, and slightly tyrannical.

The Skyhawk was hovering nearby. Plumes of white smoke erupt from its left wing as it lets loose a Scorpion missile. Cortana grinds her teeth, feeling a lurch as her brain overclocks into Spartan Time once again.

_Three._

Cortana nearly falls over as the Mjolnir’s shields are ramped to their maximum settings.

_Two._

The Skyhawk is bearing down on them, outpacing its missile.

“Now!”

Cortana jinks to the side, slapping the fuselage of the missile and sending it off course.

It still explodes several meters behind her. The resultant explosion knocks out her shields and launches her ten meters into the air. Darkness overwhelms her and several internal systems start wailing.

“Run like hell.”

She didn’t have to be told that twice, but her body is shaking violently as she hauls herself back to her feet. Her initial few strides are wobbly, growing steadier in fits and bursts. The goal’s nav-point is blurry and out of focus.

Oh, she was bleeding!

Cortana uses the bell’s tripod to stop her forward momentum. It collapses underneath her and crumples like a tin can, unable to stand up to a half-ton of armored Spartan.

She’s rewarded by the crackle of Dr. Halsey’s voice in her ear: “ _Test complete. Withdraw, Colonel Ackerson. Magnificent, Master Chief, but please don’t move. I’m sending a recovery team._ ”

She picks herself up from the bell. Despite its crushed state, she can tell it’s the very same bell she rung some thirty-odd years ago.

“We did it, John!” Cortana laughs. “That was… exhilarating.”

Gingerly, she sets the bell back onto the ground, panting and bleeding inside of her helmet. She probably broke her nose but that was nothing compared to the sense of peace she was now feeling. Whatever this had been, she had conquered it.

“I couldn’t have done it without you, either,” she says softly. “Thank you, John.”

“...Thank you, Master Chief,” John replies. “It was a pleasure working with you.”

Yeah, it was, wasn’t it?

**Author's Note:**

> so i wrote this in one sitting and uh, I might write more, depending. enjoy! find me on tumblr as bellygunnr.


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